


Guaranteed Sleep

by sanctum_c



Series: Spring Awakening 2019 [5]
Category: Final Fantasy VII (Video Game 1997)
Genre: Character Study, Cuddling & Snuggling, F/M, Insomnia, Introspection, Sharing a Bed, Sleeping Together, Trouble Sleeping
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-01
Updated: 2019-05-01
Packaged: 2021-03-09 04:41:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 799
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27197962
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sanctum_c/pseuds/sanctum_c
Summary: Tifa can't sleep.
Relationships: Tifa Lockhart/Cloud Strife
Series: Spring Awakening 2019 [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1985497
Comments: 4
Kudos: 23





	Guaranteed Sleep

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the prompt 'Letting Go'

Sleep took a long time to return to normal. There was a long and tangled time from the destruction of Meteor to the point where the world seemed capable of turning on its own again. When Tifa’s life was not interrupted by a hundred things she needed to do, when there were not a thousand emergencies every-day. When she lived in a home again, one with a complete roof, with a working electrical system and taps producing clean, drinkable water whenever she turned them on.

But when each day was not spent clearing rubble, helping other survivors, rebuilding structures, toiling with no end in sight – she was still removed from the dim memory of relaxation and no worries. What did she like to do anymore? Did she have something like hobbies? Once she might have played the piano, but finding and playing something similar was not easy. Her martial arts training was undertaken more in terms of practical application than anything she wanted to do.

Her main interests at the point she left Nibelheim. After that life had never slowed enough. Establishing the Seventh Heaven, joining Avalanche, their campaign against Shinra, operating the Seventh Heaven. She could never begrudge her fallen comrades, but she had never been able to let go like them after a mission. And after the Seventh Heaven was gone, there was the pursuit of Sephiroth, the desperate attempts to keep the Planet safe. Oh, there were those moments at Costa del Sol where she could swim. But relax? Not something she seemed capable of any more.

Even her bowing out of Avalanche’s operations to care for Cloud had not offered respite, the concerns and attempts to care for him eating up every scrap of her life. A full-circle back to the present. And here the point where she should be able to relax. Or at least sleep.

Tifa huffed and stared at the ceiling. Ridiculous. She had never had trouble sleeping before, no matter where she was and what was happening. There was no other choice. Snatched moments between running a bar and sneaking around Midgar at night. Camping out in monster-filled wilderness like some extreme-sports fanatic. Snatched moments of shut-eye in the moments before dawn after evading an opponent. At the end of a tiring day of caring for significant others, after working to restore something like the life now gone-

She never slept for long. Every blink helped; no span of sleep guaranteed. Perhaps the visit to Costa del Sol should have indicate the problem; she slept badly every night there, waking, with a racing pulse, listening for any indication of Shinra’s presence. The same problem she now encountered. When exhaustion became too much she would doze off, but any sound was capable of wakening her; a distant buzz of conversation in the distance, a shift in the wind, a creak of floorboards-

She knew the recommendations and suggestions to help her problem but none seemed to work; waiting until she felt tired ensured she would go to bed at 1 am or later – and still wake up repeatedly. Avoiding caffeine and alcohol did nothing. Winding down in bed with a book seemed to work but all too quickly lost whatever soporific affect it once had. Getting up and doing something else was too much like her old life; she was awake and alert – with the crushing sense of missing out on sleep weighing her down.

The one doctor she had secured an appointment with after weeks of waiting assured her this would pass in time, but he was unable or too rushed off his feet to give her a time-scale or anything more concrete. She was on her own. Unless she got drunk every night- Tifa shuddered. No. No kind of solution. She sighed. Nothing else for it.

Tifa rolled onto her side and with an all too familiar pang of regret reached out for Cloud’s arm. She shook him, gently hissing his name.

“Tifa?” Cloud's words came out as a mumble. “Are you okay?”

“Cold.” She squirmed closer to him. Cloud rolled over to face her with a crunch of bed springs. He slipped one arm under her head and the other around her waist. She burrowed closer.

“Better?”

“Yeah.” Tifa closed her eyes and lay her head against his chest. Cloud’s breathing rapidly settled and he drifted off once more. This wasn’t fair to him. To disturb him every-time she couldn’t sleep. But it worked. Here, in his embrace, her eyes drooped, the warmth, the smell of Cloud around her what she needed. She’d go back to the doctor to ask for more help. But at least in the meantime she had this. Tifa shuffled closer still, rolling over to face away from Cloud and fell into a deep sleep.


End file.
